My Last Confession
by owlmoose
Summary: Paine looks back on the last ten years. An epilogue of sorts to One More Confessional. Oneshot, set many years postgame.


A/N: This is one possible epilogue to "One More Confessional". I don't necessarily believe that it _has_ to have happened this way, but it certainly _could_ have. Set ten years after the events of the Crimson Spheres.

Characters, settings, and events from the game _Final Fantasy X-2_ are copyright SquareEnix.

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My Last Confession**

9AS 8.33

It's been long enough, now, that I can talk about it, at least a little.

The last thing I remember is Nooj walking toward me, a gun in his hand, a manic light in his eye, my heart pounding, too shocked to even consider escape. Then searing pain, followed by a distant cry of anguish as darkness fell, then nothing.

Hours later, I woke up in the Travel Agency in the middle of the night, gut screaming, and I wasn't able to think at all clearly. I should have stayed, I suppose, healed some more, consulted with Baralai and Gippal to find out what they thought had happened and plan our next move. But I didn't. I couldn't. I panicked, and I ran, stealing a chocobo and enough healing potions to keep myself alive for the trip to Luca. Because that's where I was headed. Where else could I go?

My old boss must have gotten the shock of his life when he found me passed out in his office, my leathers stained with blood and a half-drained potion flask in my hand. He got me to a Healer right away, and I was there for a while. My body was young and strong and healed quickly. My spirit was utterly broken and took much longer to mend. I spent over a week in that bed, my face turned to the wall, unwilling to speak to anyone, obsessively reliving the events of the previous month in my mind.

I loved him, and he shot me. I pulled him away from death, and he attempted to send me there in his place. I lived, but I might as well have died for all the interest I had in life. It was there, in that sterile healing room, that I finally understood what might drive someone to become a Deathseeker.

But I moved on from despair. I'm a survivor; that's what I do. I decided to think of the incident as an accident because I couldn't accept any of the alternatives. When I finally felt ready to face the world again, I went to the stadium boss and asked for my job back. He accepted immediately -- he'd lost half his recording team to the Crimson Squad debacle, it was the height of the season, and he needed all the hands he could get. Assigned to the Beasts, I returned to my old apartment and recorded the rest of the blitzball season. Not that my heart was in it, but my heart wouldn't have been in anything. At least the work gave me something to do with myself.

None of the guys sought me out during that time. Nooj thought I was dead; by the time he learned differently, he was too firmly under Shuyin's control to act on his own. I was of no use to Shuyin, so he stayed away. Because of my abrupt disappearance after the shooting incident, Gippal and Baralai didn't realize that Nooj had attacked me as well and assumed that I had been in league with him. I didn't discover any of this until much later, of course. I might have liked to connect with Gippal, but I was very angry to learn that Baralai had realigned himself with Yevon -- it was a betrayal almost as deep as being shot had been. So I washed my hands of both of them. I didn't see or speak to any of my former comrades for almost two years.

I moved in a fog most days, that first blitz season. The destruction of Sin registered, as did the fall of Yevon, but otherwise I concentrated on my job. The only way not to think about the events of the Crimson Squad training was to shut them out, and the rest of the world went with them. In particular, human connection eluded me, and I preferred it that way. Until one night near the end of the season, when I bumped into Berrick in a blitzer pub. I was at my dark corner table, nursing a drink, when the waiter brought me another. "Complements of the gentleman at the bar," he said, and pointed to the familiar figure sitting there.

I must have spent half an hour arguing with myself about what to do next, but in the end, loneliness won out: I waved him over. We talked a little and drank a lot. When the bar closed, he came home with me by silent agreement. He followed me through the door and put his arms around me, and I broke down in noisy, helpless tears.

To his eternal credit, Berrick simply carried me to the bed and lay down with me, not asking any questions or making any verbal reassurances, just holding me as I let out the pain and rage that I'd held inside for so many months. After what seemed like hours, I reached for him in an entirely different way, and he reached back, taking me with a rough tenderness that was exactly what I needed.

I never told Berrick what had happened to me, in the desert, at Mushroom Rock, on the Highroad. All he knew was that I had suffered a terrible loss and needed to be brought back into the land of the living. And he did it. The combination of familiarity and difference helped remind me that there were other men in the world and that it was all right for me to desire them. I couldn't love him, but he didn't need me to. We're still good friends. I owe him a lot.

He and I spent that off-season together, working on a salvage ship. Then the next year, I requested a transfer to follow the Psyches and it was granted. And that's how I met Buddy -- the Al Bhed won the final tournament that year and he came to the victory party. We got to talking about sphere hunting, and he invited me to join the Gullwings. I accepted for many reasons. My affair with Berrick had basically run its course by that point, and the idea of getting out of the recording business was very appealing. And of course the airship was a huge draw. But first and foremost, I hoped to find something to explain what had happened in the cave. Within a few days I had kissed Berrick goodbye, resigned my position, and set up quarters on the Celsius.

I almost quit the Gullwings half a dozen times during the first month. I got on with Buddy from the start, and Shinra mostly kept to himself, but the siblings drove me to distraction. Brother and Rikku were two of a kind -- hyperactive, loud, nosy, just plain irritating. I had to restrain myself from tossing Rikku off the deck more than once. But it was Brother's airship, so I had to put up with him, and I figured he wouldn't take it too well if I murdered his sister. And I so loved flying. Even just being a passenger was everything I had hoped for. I took to spending most of my time on the deck, feeling the wind in my hair and watching the ocean or the landscape speed by below.

We came across spheres pretty regularly -- a few dresspheres, some boring historical documents, old blitz recordings. It wasn't the challenge I'd been hoping for, though, and we never found anything related to my past. Things didn't really get interesting until Rikku found that sphere of Shuyin and Yuna came aboard.

I wasn't sure what to make of Yuna at first. Part of me was in awe of her -- with the help of only a few companions, she had destroyed Sin for good and taken down Yevon in the process. (I was able to muster more respect for Rikku by reminding myself that she had been among those companions.) But Yuna was so sweet and perky and good that I had a hard time relating to her. Eventually, though, as I came to know her I started to consider her a friend, even to open up to her a little. I even warmed to Rikku, when she wasn't pissing me off by bouncing off the walls and asking too many questions. I was part of a team again, and I found that I had missed it.

I guess I always knew that my path would start crossing with the guys' eventually. Encountering Nooj was hardest, of course. When I first saw him in Kilika, the impulse to run and hide warred with the desire to grab him and kiss him, paralyzing me completely. He noticed me, of course, at the back of the crowd. I saw the flash of recognition in his eyes, but otherwise I could not read him. Then, when we returned the sphere we stole to the Youth League -- I had argued against that, on the basis that the organization was reckless, but if I was being honest with myself I knew it was at least partly that I would rather face Baralai given a choice -- all I could do was snap at him. Every chance meeting got more difficult: finding him in front of the cave where it all started to go wrong, seeing him with Leblanc, watching him as my memories played out on the spheres we found.

And then came the meeting beneath Bevelle. When I saw my old teammates playing back the incident in the cave, when Baralai turned on Nooj and was ready to pull the trigger, I could hold back no more and I cried out. And he looked up and saw me, really _saw_ me for the first time in two years, and the fear in his voice when he warned me to get away was so real. This Nooj was the man I remembered, the man I loved. I began to feel hope again, hope that the terrible moment on the Highroad had been some sort of accident or mistake after all. And when we returned to the cave and I learned the truth about the shooting, that Shuyin had been pulling the strings, that Nooj hadn't meant to kill me after all, my hope intensified to almost unbearable levels.

Until we met again on the Farplane, at the feet of Vegnagun, and Nooj's intent was to kill himself and take Shuyin with him. It was the sand-bear all over again, except this time I couldn't just fire a gun and make the threat go away. I wanted to tell him that I still loved him, that I needed him to live as he'd once promised he would, but I couldn't make the words come. All I could do was feebly protest that he was our captain. It wasn't enough.

Then Yuna did what I should have done: she stood up to him and told him no, that we would find a way to defeat Shuyin that wouldn't require anyone to sacrifice themselves. Any doubts I'd had about Yuna washed away at that moment. Finally, Nooj had met his match for strength of will, and he agreed to her plan. When we split up to fight Vegnagun, and he looked into my eyes and told me he'd see me later, I almost fell apart right then and there. He had come back from the brink of suicide again, and maybe this time I could hold on to him.

It was no time to get emotional, though -- we had a ghost to exorcise and an unstoppable machina weapon to dismantle. When the battle was won, and Baralai was safe in Gippal's arms, for just a moment I thought I had won, too. But then there was Leblanc, her face shining as Nooj returned to her. So I left them there, with no intention of speaking to him again.

Two weeks later, Nooj showed up on Besaid, where I had temporarily settled with the rest of the Gullwings. He traveled there by boat, which I found oddly touching -- he'd put up with the seasickness medication he so despised just to see me again. He told me that he had broken with Leblanc, he begged forgiveness for the incident on the Highroad, and he asked me for another chance.

I made him sweat for all of thirty seconds before launching myself into his arms. We spent most of the next week in secluded retreat on the island, relearning one another, making up for two years of loneliness and lost time. Then I went back with him to Mushroom Rock Road, hitching a ride on the Celsius, returning to my place at his side as he attempted to make peace with Baralai and New Yevon and to whip the Youth League into a smaller, more stable fighting force.

We tried to make it work for a year. But so many things loomed large between us: the shooting on the Highroad, his willingness to die on the Farplane, even Leblanc. He started taking on more and more dangerous missions, and I began to fear that he was hunting death again. In the end, I never truly learned to trust him, to believe that he wouldn't hurt me or himself. And he never fully broke free of the shell he had retreated into when he thought he'd killed me. I still loved him, and I think he loved me, too, but the magic we had captured in the desert, on the boat, by a calm pool in a quiet grove, was gone. No one was to blame, unless you count Shuyin, but that didn't change the facts.

So I left.

He wasn't happy about it, but my mind was made up. The memory of the powerful, beautiful thing we had once shared was just too strong. I might have been willing to settle for a pale imitation with someone else, but not with him. We exchanged some harsh words that day, and as I walked away I heard the door to his heart slam shut.

I drifted for awhile, a lost soul, with no idea what I wanted to do, no plans, no goals. When you're in that state, there's really only one place to go: Home.

New Home, to be precise. The Al Bhed needed guards to protect the site from fiends while they rebuilt, and they weren't inclined to be picky. My connections to Brother, Rikku, and Gippal were more than enough to get me in the door, and my battle skills earned me respect and a good position. They taught me to pilot a hover and, finally, an airship. When the construction was finished, I stayed on with the Al Bhed militia. They've given me my own ship now, the _Caagan_. Flying one is even better than I ever dreamed possible.

If you had told me right after the Crimson Squad ordeal that I would be settling on Bikanel Island permanently, I would have said you were crazy, but actually I'm quite content to make this my home. Now that I know how to dress for the desert and my skin has toughened up, the conditions are much easier to bear, and the starkness of the dunes is beautiful in its own way. It's a fine place to live, and the Al Bhed are a refreshingly genuine people. I have many friends here, close ones, although I've kept away from any serious romantic entanglements. I take lovers as I please, but I never let myself get too deeply attached. Buddy and I have been involved off and on for some years now, though we are always both free to pursue other options. The arrangement suits us. He's a good man, and not at all complicated.

I don't see much of my other old friends. Brother has settled down a lot in recent years, taking on more and more responsibility as his father heads into retirement. I find him more tolerable as a result, but we still aren't particularly close. Gippal is probably my closest friend other than Buddy. He and Rikku are both in and out of Bikanel; I enjoy their company when I see them. I drifted away from Yuna. We tell each other it's because we're both busy, and that's not a lie, but in truth I'm jealous of her. She found her Tidus, reunited with the love she lost for two years, and now she has everything she ever wanted -- the happy marriage, the two beautiful children, the perfect cottage on Besaid. It's hardly the life I would have chosen for myself, but it still hurts to watch her living her happily-ever-after. I know how petty that is, but I can't help it. So I avoid her, and probably always will. As for Baralai, he and I never really reconciled. We're cordial for Gippal's sake, but we're not friends anymore. Of all the connections I've lost, I think that one makes me the saddest.

For years, I did my best to avoid all news about Nooj. It was easiest to pretend that he didn't exist. But he was too public a figure, so I couldn't keep away from hearing about him entirely. When I learned that he'd finally found the death he'd been seeking, I grieved, but I also felt a little relieved that I wouldn't have to worry about him anymore. And maybe he's at peace now. I hope so, anyway.

There is a part of me that still loves him, even though he is gone -- I gave him too much of myself to ever get it all back. But I can live with that. I think.

Ten years ago today, I got on a boat heading for Bevelle and changed my life forever. Less than a month later, everything went to hell. I put down my pen that day and never picked it up again -- the very idea of keeping a journal reminded me too much of my days with Squadron Five. But Gippal gave me this device for my twenty-sixth birthday last month, and now I feel the need to pick it up. It's been long enough, now, that I can think of myself as a different person, and maybe returning to this old habit will help me figure out who that person is. It's worth a try, anyway.


End file.
